next to your heartbeat (where i should be)
by shineyma
Summary: As ordered, Jemma has called in her ex-husband to assist in the fight against Centipede. He's happy to help, but she's still fairly certain it will all end in tears. [Sequel to "our hearts were never broken (and time's forever frozen)."]


A/N: I didn't want to write a sequel to _our hearts were never broken (and time's forever frozen)_ , but we don't always get what we want. So here you go!

Title is, again, from Ed Sheeran's _Photograph_. Thanks for reading and, as always, please be gentle if you review!

* * *

Jemma does _not_ get nine hours to gather her composure. In point of fact, Jemma gets fifteen minutes.

Precisely sixteen minutes after she texts Coulson confirmation that Grant is on his way, she hears the door open. She knows exactly who it is—was in fact expecting her even earlier—and therefore doesn't bother to pull her eyes away from the ceiling to look.

"So," Skye says, and flops down on the bed beside her. "Divorced, huh?"

"Yes," she says. "I'm afraid so."

"So the Ward in your name's from him," Skye concludes, knocking her shoulder against Jemma's as she gets comfortable. "I always thought it was just because you were British."

"I'm sorry?"

"You know, the hyphenated last name thing," Skye says. "You're always seeing British people with two last names. Like Rosie Huntington-Whiteley."

Jemma laughs, some of the tightness in her chest easing to make way for affection. "I'm not _that_ posh, Skye. No, the Ward is from Grant. My ex-husband."

"Huh." Skye cuddles a little closer, offering preemptive comfort. "So what happened? I mean, it can't be too horrible if you're still using his name, right?"

Jemma breathes in a slow breath that comes out unfortunately shaky on the exhale. Skye moves closer.

"Right?" she presses, worried. "I mean he didn't cheat on you or—or hurt you or anything, right?"

"No," Jemma says. She fumbles for Skye's hand and squeezes it tight, doing her best to be reassuring. "No, it was nothing like that. You're right; I wouldn't be using his name, still, were that the case."

"So what, then?" Skye asks.

Jemma sighs and sits up. She could have this conversation staring at the ceiling—she knows Skye would let her—but it feels cowardly. In the past six months, Skye has become as close to her as a sister; Jemma certainly should have spoken to her about Grant earlier, and the least she can do now is make eye contact while she explains.

"It wasn't horrible at all, really," she says, quietly, as Skye pushes herself up. "Despite what the films would have you believe, not every marriage ends terribly. Sometimes things simply…don't work out."

She's not trying to brush Skye off, merely get her thoughts in order, and Skye seems to realize it. She stays quiet, waiting patiently as Jemma attempts to collect herself.

"Grant is a specialist," she says finally. "One of the best. He was trained by Hawkeye and has been compared favorably to the Black Widow."

Skye's eyes go wide—she's quite the Avengers fan—but otherwise bites back her reaction to this news. Jemma is grateful for it; she's not sure she'll be able to get through this if Skye interrupts.

"The thing about that," she says, "Is that the best specialists are always in the highest demand. From the very first days of our relationship, Grant was being sent away for weeks at a time—sometimes even months. And that was—well. It wasn't fun, certainly, but it was bearable. It was just—stressful."

She has to stop for a moment and just…breathe. It's been years, but she still remembers perfectly the sheer _weight_ of her worry for him, how she went through her days with a lump in her throat, certain that every phone call was news of him, that every knock on the door was Clint coming to tell her she'd lost him.

"But I knew what I was getting into when I started dating him, and when I married him as well. I was expecting the absences."

She draws her knees up and hugs them to her chest, feeling decidedly fragile. She's never had to explain this before, had to find a way to put to words how her marriage failed. Fitz, of course, was there to see it, and she fobbed her parents off with an excuse.

"What I wasn't expecting," she continues, "Is how the absences _changed_ after we married. Or, no, not the absences, but his return." Tears are prickling at her eyes, which is ridiculous. "When we were dating—and when we were engaged—Grant would be very quiet when he came back from missions. So I would do most of the talking. I'd tell him all about what I'd been up to while he was away, and he would ask deliberately foolish questions about my work, and…"

She breaks off, dragging in a ragged breath, and Skye watches her with worried eyes.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," she offers.

"No, I do," she says. "It's just…difficult."

They were such good memories at the time—how he sought her out as soon as he his debriefs were over, how they cuddled together on the couch for hours, so close that she could feel his low, quiet questions seep into her skin. She hated to see the effect his assignments had on him, but it felt _right_ that she could help him through it.

The memories are bitter now, because of what came after. She regrets that more than she could possibly say.

"My point was, he would be upset when he came home, but we worked through it together. It soothed him, I think, hearing about my nice, safe life in the lab, and it helped to keep him involved in my life despite how often he was away."

"Sounds nice," Skye says, quietly wistful.

Jemma manages a smile. "It was. However, after we married, Grant was…different. When he came home, he was more than simply quiet. He was distant." She hugs her knees a little more tightly. "He wouldn't touch me. He would barely speak at all. Eventually, he would return to his normal self, and he would be very apologetic, but soon enough, he would be sent away again, and when he returned…"

She trails off as familiar misery wells in her chest. Spoken aloud, it sounds so simple—so cut and dry. But it was horrible, unbearable, to live it. To watch the man she loved draw away from her, to see her marriage fracture by degrees…

"Over time, we simply grew apart," she concludes. There was nothing simple about it—about the stress and the loneliness and the stranger staring out at her from her husband's eyes—but she can't bring herself to go into any further detail. "Eventually, I couldn't take it any longer. So I asked for a divorce."

"I'm sorry," Skye says. She's been inching carefully closer as Jemma spoke; now, she's practically on top of her. "That sounds awful."

"The worst part," Jemma starts, and is mortified to hear her voice break, "Is that he didn't fight me at all on it. Well, no." She laughs, tearily. "He did fight me, but only over—he wanted to give me alimony. I told him I neither needed nor wanted it, but he was very insistent."

"Jemma…"

"He was so kind, Skye," she says. "He loves me, and I—"

Her voice breaks again as her misery wells up, and she cuts herself off, horribly aware that if she says another word, she'll cry.

She hates it—hates that even now, two years down the line, it can still return and overwhelm her so quickly. She spent so long dwelling in guilt and unhappiness; it's so unfair that removing herself from the situation did nothing to end it.

"I'm sorry," Skye says, and pulls her into a fierce hug. "I'm sorry, you don't have to explain anymore." She squeezes her tight, warm and so determinedly comforting, like only Skye can be.

Even as she clings to Skye, she tries to remind herself that this is ridiculous. SHIELD has fallen. Most of her friends are dead or, worse, traitors. Their entire world is in shambles. Skye was kidnapped and had her heart broken _yesterday_. It's absurd that Jemma is near tears over Grant—over her years-old divorce.

They have things to do. This is no time for Jemma to have a breakdown over old wounds.

But the awful hollowness in her chest cares nothing for logic, not when it can remind her of the terrible, quiet resignation on Grant's face when he signed the divorce papers. Not when it can dwell on the forced smile he gave her, the warmth of his hands as he pressed into hers his copy of their house key.

Not when she can recall, with perfect clarity, the stutter in his breathing as he hugged her goodbye.

"I'm sorry," she says into Skye's shoulder, trying to distract herself from the memories. "I should have told you ages ago, I just—"

"It's okay," Skye interrupts. "I get it. It's not like I'm in a hurry to tell you about _my_ old relationships."

She's trying for a light tone, Jemma thinks, but falls somewhat short of it; concerned, Jemma pulls back to look at her.

"Skye?" she asks. "What is it?"

"I kissed Rollins," Skye says, all in rush. "At Providence, while you guys were gone. I kissed him. And then I found Eric, and then Rollins _kidnapped_ me, and he was saying all this stuff—about how, how he has _feelings_ for me, and they're real, even though everything else—"

"Skye," Jemma says, concerned at the way Skye's breathing is speeding up. "It's all right. Take a deep breath; you're all right." She hugs her close again, throat tight; she knew something happened between Skye and Rollins, but _this_?

"It was everything I wanted from him," Skye says, and laughs bitterly, eyes wet with tears. "I just never thought he'd say it while he was holding me hostage."

Her tears well over, and Jemma holds her through it, trying to hold back tears of her own. She feels sick; how must this have been weighing on Skye, that their positions have changed so quickly—from comforted to comforter in the span of a single moment?

That bastard. Jemma's never wished death on anyone, not ever, but she might just have to start.

x

"You're brooding, kid."

Grant sighs. He doesn't bother to protest the moniker; he might be thirty-one years old, but he has the unfortunate feeling that Clint is always gonna see him as that broken, bitter teenager he saved from prison.

So all he says is, "I'm not brooding. Sir."

The downturn of Clint's mouth says _don't call me sir_. Grant flicks an eyebrow in return, a silent _then don't call me kid_. Clint smirks.

"You're definitely brooding," he says. He drums his fingers on the steering wheel, a nervous habit belying his easy tone. "You said Jemma was fine."

"I said she wasn't injured," Grant corrects. He checks the surrounding area for anything suspicious—a nervous habit of his own. "She sounded horrible." A man ambles down the nearby sidewalk; Grant watches him for a minute and determines that he's likely genuinely homeless, rather than an enemy agent in disguise. "And I don't know anything about her team."

He knows Fitz is on it, of course, and that Trip's a new addition, but other than that, her otherwise very detailed explanation was lacking. She was very careful not to use names as she walked him through her team's encounters with Centipede; it was all _my commanding officer, our hacker, our pilot, our specialist_.

It's not like Jemma to watch her words, and it puts his nerves on edge that she did. She was holding something back; he just doesn't know what.

"Well, we're about to meet them," Clint says as the light turns green and he makes a left turn into the parking lot of the Vagabond Inn. "So stop brooding and put on a smile for your wife."

"She's not my wife," Grant reminds him.

"Whatever," Clint says. He and Natasha have never been quiet about their disapproval of the divorce. They understand Jemma's reasons for wanting it, almost as well as they understand Grant's reasons for not fighting it, but that doesn't mean they like it.

That's fine; Grant doesn't like it, either. As long as they aim their disapproval at him and not Jemma, he doesn't care.

"The point is, if Jemma sees you looking like this, she'll get upset, and this week has been bad enough without exposure to Jemma's sad face, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," he says, because it's a fair point.

So he does his best to smile—or at least not frown—as they get out of the car. It's not easy; his ribs are killing him, and the way he has to unbend from the tiny sedan pulls on them uncomfortably.

He has his emergency phone in his pocket, and he's about to pull it out to call Jemma and find out which room she's in when he spots her. She's beside the small hotel pool, sharing a lounge chair with a dark-haired woman he doesn't recognize. Fitz is at the end of a lounge chair next to them, having what appears to be a heated argument with the woman.

Jemma excuses herself from the other two as soon as she spots Grant and Clint, and he gives her a quick once-over when she stands. There's worry in her posture, more than a little stress in the set of her shoulders, but he doesn't see anything that would indicate pain or discomfort.

She was telling the truth, then, when she said she wasn't injured. It's a relief.

She's smiling as she approaches them, and his heart twists with some combination of longing and disappointment. Her smile is beautiful—everything about her is beautiful—but it's small, almost subdued. It used to be that her whole face would light up whenever she saw him, and knowing it's his own fault that he lost that doesn't make him miss it any less.

"Grant," she says when she reaches them. "Thank you so much for coming."

She hugs him, and for a second, all of his tension disappears. (He just...misses her. A lot.) But he's careful to keep his hold light, friendly, and when she pulls back (way too soon), he lets her go without a fight. His tension comes rushing back, but he makes sure to keep it off his face.

"Nowhere else I'd rather be," he says honestly, and she gives him another smile, quietly pleased, before turning to Clint.

"Hello, Clint," she says.

"Hey, Jem." He folds her in a hug, and the look he gives Grant over the top of her head speaks volumes.

It's not his imagination, then. There's something behind Jemma's subdued greeting, something more than the usual post-divorce awkwardness.

(Awkwardness he'll take. It's so much better than how she was at the end, the quiet misery that overtook her as he crushed her by degrees.)

"You wanna tell us what's wrong?" Clint asks, as Jemma draws away from him.

"What isn't?" she asks, a little bitterly. Then she shakes her head before they can reply. "I'm sorry. It's just...been a very long few days."

There's something brittle behind her apologetic smile, something wounded, and Grant remembers her airy, falsely casual mention that their specialist was HYDRA. He wonders how she found out about that, and just how hard of a fight the mole went down with.

But this isn't the time for pressing on that bruise, so he changes the subject.

"New friend?" he asks, nodding behind her. Fitz and the woman are both hanging back, Fitz waiting impatiently and the woman staring with unabashed interest.

Jemma turns to look, and her smile slides into something fond. "Yes. That's Skye, our hacker. She's terribly interested in you; I'm afraid there's an interrogation in your future."

He gives Skye a long look, evaluating, and then shrugs a little.

"I think I can take her."

"I don't know," Clint muses. "She looks scrappy."

What she looks like is a rookie. She's got the uneasy tension of the newly trained, the awareness that she should be on guard mixed with a discomfort that says she hasn't mastered the art. Grant remembers Jemma's story, that the hacker was the one who took two to the gut and was saved by this GH-325 drug, and can't help but be impressed.

Not many rookies would stick around after that.

"She is," Jemma confirms with quiet pride, and motions her and Fitz over.

"Ward, Barton," Fitz says, shaking their hands. He was angry at Grant after the divorce, furious over the damage done to Jemma, but they've gotten to a better place. "Nice of you to come."

"Of course," Grant says. Clint restricts himself to a nod.

Then they both turn their attention to Skye, who beams at them.

"Hi," she says. "I'm Skye." She aims a slightly larger smile at Clint. "Big fan."

For some reason, this makes Jemma and Fitz exchange a worried look. Grant sees Clint note it, but he keeps an easy smile on his face as he shakes Skye's offered hand.

"Thanks," he says. "Nice to meet you." He gives Grant a cocky smirk. "She's a fan."

"She doesn't know what she's saying," Grant tells him, shaking his head. "It's not her fault; she's buying into the propaganda."

They've turned the superhero thing into a joke between them, because it's just too bizarre to handle it any other way. Neither one of them is really prepared to seriously confront the fact that there are literal _action figures_ of Clint and Natasha.

"And you must be Grant," Skye says. She gives him a very thorough once-over, then nudges Jemma. " _Nice_ , Simmons. I'm impressed."

Jemma laughs, which is even more rewarding than the hilariously disgusted face Fitz makes.

"He is something, isn't he?" she asks, giving him a playful smile. He only has a second to enjoy the sight, though, before it becomes a frown. "Although I must say that his complete lack of self-preservation instinct rather detracts from it. Grant, have you had your injuries tended at _all_?"

Okay, that's a surprise. Aside from a few abrasions on his face and some bruising on his knuckles, all of his injuries are hidden by his clothes. There's no reason she should know he has them. He flicks a glance at Clint, who shrugs.

"I've been icing my bruises, if that's what you mean," he says.

"It's not," she says. She gives him a weirdly clinical once-over. "Are your ribs broken or cracked?"

"…Cracked," he says slowly. "And I've got 'em wrapped. How did you…?"

Fitz and Skye both laugh.

"Don't test Doctor Simmons," Skye advises.

"She always knows," Fitz agrees wisely.

"You're favoring your left side," Jemma tells him, ignoring them. "It's obvious."

"To someone with training," Grant says, and raises a prompting eyebrow at her when she fails to explain.

"I hope you haven't been letting someone on your team train you," Clint says. His tone is light, but Grant can tell he's just as disturbed by this development as he is. "After all the times you've refused Nat's offers…you'll hurt her feelings if you're not careful."

Skye's eyes widen, and she elbows Fitz, hissing something in his ear. He rolls his eyes and walks away, towards the portico, where one of the motel room doors opens for him after a quick knock.

"Happily, Natasha's feelings will remain undented." Jemma smiles uncomfortably. "It's not that sort of training. I'm our team's medic; I've simply had quite a lot of practice, recently, in deducing injury."

He doesn't know where to start dissecting that sentence: the part where, as far as he knows, the only medical training Jemma has is a first-aid course she took after the second time he came home with a concussion, or the part where her team has apparently received injury frequently enough that after only six months, she can identify damaged ribs at a single glance.

"But you're a scientist," Clint says, after a startled pause. Grant is still trying to find his voice. "Not a doctor."

She sighs, aggrieved. "Yes, so I've tried to tell…" She hesitates. "My commanding officer. However, needs must, and all that. It hasn't worked out _too_ terribly."

"She's badass," Skye says, in a tone that just dares them to argue. "She saved my life like three times."

Jemma glances at her, a furrow in her brow. "I'm not sure—"

"Do not test me, Simmons, the thing with the vampire _totally_ counts."

"It was not a _vampire_ , Skye, it—"

"Vam. Pire."

"My point," Jemma says, turning away from Skye with a roll of her eyes, "Is that my time as a medic has been very educational, and _you_ , Grant Ward, are injured."

"Only a little," he promises, trying to ignore the warm feeling her obvious concern is causing him. It's been a long time since she last fretted over his carelessness, and he's aware it's beyond messed up that it makes him so happy to have her do it again. "And yeah, I've been treated already."

(They're gonna come back to this her being a medic thing later. For now, he'll let her move the conversation along.)

She eyes him skeptically, then turns to Clint.

"He has," Clint confirms, and lifts his hands. "And I'm barely scratched. We're fine, Jem."

" _I'll_ say," Skye mutters, and nudges Jemma.

She rolls her eyes, but Grant thinks she looks a little relieved by the remark, which is…weird.

Before he can decide whether to comment on it (though he's leaning towards not), he hears one of the nearby doors open. He glances automatically in that direction, and his mind stutters to a halt at the sight of Melinda May leaning out of the room Fitz went into earlier.

What.

"We're ready for you," she tells Jemma, then nods to him and Barton. "Boys."

She disappears back into the room before either of them can respond.

"May?" he asks, stunned. "Seriously? _Melinda May_ is on your team?"

"Is that a problem?" Skye asks. Her tone is joking, but there's an edge behind it.

"It's not a problem," Clint steps in. "Just a surprise. She's been in Administration for years. Didn't think she'd ever go back to the field."

"She's just the pilot," Jemma says, kind of awkwardly.

Grant narrows his eyes. "What aren't you saying?"

"You are the _worst_ at lying," Skye informs her, eyes wide. "Also subterfuge. Actually, basically anything other than being one-hundred percent honest—you are impressively bad."

"I'm getting better!" Jemma defends.

"Jemma."

"Just," she sighs, looking from him to Clint and back, and grimaces. "Come along. You'll see."

It's pretty immediately obvious what they're supposed to see, because the only person in the room, aside from May and Fitz, is a dead man.

"What the _fuck_."

Clint's voice is low, dangerous, and all the confirmation he needs that his eyes aren't playing tricks on him. That's definitely Coulson.

Grant's surprised at the strength of the anger that suddenly overtakes him, but he probably shouldn't be. Clint is more than just his supervising officer, and Natasha is more than just his supervising officer's partner. They saved him from himself and turned him into the man he is today. He owes them everything.

They're his _family_ , and they mourned Coulson. He saw how Coulson's death affected them, had to stand helplessly by while they grieved. Yet here Coulson stands, alive and well, which means that grief was for _nothing_. Clint's guilt, Natasha's blank-faced silence…pointless. Unnecessary.

Add to that the fact that Coulson is also apparently the man who led Jemma into all the danger she's been in since she joined this team (and he knows there was a lot of it; even aside from what she said about practice with injuries, he could hear the understatement in her account of the Centipede shit, the silent _you don't know the half of it_ )…

Yeah. From that perspective, his sudden fury isn't all that surprising.

Coulson apparently wants to get the less emotional greeting out of the way first, because he ignores Clint for the moment. "Thank you for coming, Agent Ward. We appreciate the help."

Grant punches him.

"Grant!" Jemma exclaims, voice high and sharp with shock, over the rest of the room's reaction. She grabs his arm, and he lets her pull him back. "What on _earth_ —"

"It's all right, Simmons," Coulson interrupts, shifting his jaw carefully, testing. "Can't say I wasn't warned, can I?"

"I thought you were _joking_ about the murder," Skye mutters to Fitz.

"Ha," Fitz says. "That was nothing. Wait until he hears about the Chitauri incident."

"Oh, man. Dibs on _not_ being the one to tell him about the grenade."

Grant has a feeling he really does _not_ want to know about either of those things (a fucking _grenade_ , really?), but he makes a mental note about them anyway. Then he tunes out their conversation in favor of Clint.

He's stock still, so motionless he could be on sniper duty. Not a good sign.

Coulson obviously agrees. "Barton—"

"Everyone out," Clint orders.

"Whoa, no way," Skye starts, even as Jemma is saying, "I'm not sure that's—"

"Grant."

"On it," he says, and in short order, he's got everyone out of the room. Luckily, May doesn't put up a fight at all; she just gives Coulson a look and walks out. "You want me to stay?"

Clint shakes his head sharply, and Grant nods. He claps his hand to Clint's shoulder, squeezes once—reaffirming—and leaves. He finds Jemma, Fitz, and Skye standing clustered just outside the door and sighs.

"You should probably find somewhere else to be," he says, calmly, over a crash from inside the room. "They've got a lot to work out."

"Sounds like," Skye says, eyeing the door behind him warily. "What's his deal?"

"Before his supposed death, Agent Coulson worked very closely with Clint," Jemma says softly. "I imagine he's feeling rather betrayed."

Her words have a visible effect on Skye—and even Fitz, who should've known already. He eyes them, considering.

Skye sees him looking and clears her throat, giving Jemma a playful smile. "So, violence as a first resort, huh?"

Jemma flushes.

"Be honest," Skye says. "He's totally where you picked up your habit of shooting superior officers in the chest."

What _._

"What?" he asks.

"Non-fatally!" Jemma says quickly, and then turns a glare on Skye. "And a single, isolated incident _hardly_ constitutes a habit, so—"

"No, seriously," he cuts in. " _What_?"

"You two should take a minute," Skye suggests brightly. "Catch up. We'll go…call Trip, see how his mission's going."

"Yes," Fitz agrees. "Excellent idea, Skye!"

Jemma opens her mouth, but before she can speak, Skye and Fitz hurry away towards the parking lot. She sighs.

"Where are they even _going_?" she mutters, mostly to herself. Then she turns to Grant, apologetic. "I'm sorry; she's not at all subtle."

He doesn't mind. "It _would_ be nice to catch up. If you want."

He's careful to keep his tone light, face open—just a friendly offer with no pressure behind it. It's too easy to influence Jemma, to guilt her into things she doesn't really want, and he's done enough of that already.

He wants desperately for her to say yes—is greedy for every minute with her he can get—but not at the cost of her own comfort.

"Yes," she says, after a long moment. "I'd like that." She motions vaguely to the left. "Skye and I are sharing the room next door. Perhaps we could speak there; that way we can keep an ear out and make certain that Clint doesn't _actually_ kill Agent Coulson."

"Sounds good," he says, and follows her to the aforementioned room. "Speaking of which, exactly how is that possible? Last I heard, Coulson was extremely dead."

Jemma doesn't answer until she's ushered him into the room and locked the door firmly behind them.

"You'll recall I mentioned that my commanding officer had previous experience with the GH-325?" she asks.

"Yeah," he says slowly. "You're not saying—?"

"It brought him back to life," she says. "Several days after his death." She hugs herself, distressed, and he itches with the urge to pull her into his arms. But he lost that right years ago, so he shoves his hands in his pockets and keeps his distance. "The GH-325 is…unspeakably powerful. It's capable of full cellular regeneration; it began to mend Coulson's heart—which was torn entirely in half—mere minutes after he received his first dose."

Grant has to take a second to absorb that. Then he has to take a second to readjust his assessment of the threat the GH-325 poses; HYDRA in possession of a miraculous healing drug is bad, but HYDRA in possession of a drug capable of raising the _dead_?

This is even worse than he thought it was.

"Wow," he says eventually. "That's…wow."

"Quite," Jemma agrees, and drops down to sit on the edge of one of the beds. "So you understand our position."

It definitely explains why her whole team is sticking around—why Trip has joined up. SHIELD may be gone, but they're still SHIELD agents, and HYDRA's an even bigger threat than he anticipated. Of course they—of course _Jemma_ —couldn't walk away.

"I do," he says. "You're in a tough spot. I'm glad you called." He hesitates, but the pull is too strong to resist; he sits down next to her, careful to leave a decent amount of space between them. "You wanna tell me the rest of it?"

"What rest of it?" she asks, but there's evasion, not confusion, in her posture.

"Sweetheart," he starts, and then bites his tongue. "Sorry. Jemma." He clears his throat, uncomfortably aware of how still she's gone. "I'm sorry. It's just…"

"Habit," she offers quietly. "It's fine, Grant."

It's not, but dwelling on it won't make it better.

"What I was going to say," he says. "Is that you're upset." He has to fist his hands on his thighs to keep from reaching for her—from pulling her in close, from kissing away the haunted look in her eyes, from wrapping her in his arms and holding on until the horrible tension disappears from her shoulders. "I'd like to help, if I can."

She looks ready to flee at any second, and as much as it would hurt, he _wishes_ that it was his presence causing it. But it's not. This is something else, something bigger than the old wounds between them.

"I…" she takes a deep breath, and he can see the moment she decides not to dodge the implied question. "I told you that our specialist was HYDRA."

"You did," he agrees.

"What I didn't tell you was that he didn't reveal himself right away," she says. "We were in hiding at a secret base in Canada. One of Fury's. There was a man there—Eric Koenig. He was…eccentric, but kind. He'd been alone for years, keeping the base. I think he was glad of the company." She shivers. "We needed shelter, and he provided it. We would have been safe there."

"Except you had a mole."

"Except we had a mole," she echoes quietly. "There was—the Fridge fell. Did I tell you that?"

"Yeah," he says. "You did."

He passed on word of that to Stark before leaving the Tower, and he has the feeling the Avengers will be all over it.

"We went after one of the prisoners," she says. "Coulson had a personal connection to him, so he knew exactly where he would go." She swallows. "We left our specialist behind because he was injured—from the fall of the Fridge, he claimed, though in retrospect he must have been part of the invading force. We also…we also left Skye." Her breathing is ragged, and he can't help himself any longer; he reaches over and lays a hand on her knee, just for the contact.

She grabs it in both of hers and clings like it's a lifeline. It would be gratifying if he weren't so worried for her.

"We didn't know," she says. "We—he'd saved all our lives so many times. He was—he was _family_. How were we to know he was HYDRA?"

"You couldn't have," he tells her firmly. She obviously needs to hear it, and it's true. "HYDRA had everyone fooled, Jemma." He shifts slightly closer to her; she does him one better and curls right up against his side, letting go of his hand in favor of hugging his arm. He wishes he could enjoy it, but he's worried about her—about where this story is going. "He hurt Skye?"

"Emotionally more than anything else, I believe," she says. "The two of them…well, there was something there. The betrayal hit her particularly hard. The hard drive I mentioned, it was hers. He kidnapped her and forced her to decrypt it." Her voice wavers, and he has the feeling they've reached the worst part. "We came back to the base and it was empty. Skye and—and _him_ gone, along with our plane. And no sign of Agent Koenig."

"He killed him," Grant concludes. It's obvious; Skye was kept alive to decrypt the hard drive. Koenig, presumably, could offer no such service.

"I found him," she says. "Stuffed in a vent like some—some—"

She's crying, and Grant is utterly powerless not to offer comfort. He tugs her into his lap and hugs her close, rubbing one hand up and down her back soothingly.

The last time he did this, she was trying to ask for a divorce. She made it halfway through what he could tell was a carefully planned speech before breaking down, and it wasn't until he was already holding her that it occurred to him she might prefer he not—what with wanting to divorce him and all.

"He was our friend," she chokes out. "All those people—Koenig and Hand and—and—"

He murmurs soothing words automatically—reassurances that she's fine, that he's got her, that everything will be okay—but his mind is stuck in that memory. He doesn't deserve to offer her comfort.

He knows she feels guilty about how easily he agreed to the divorce. Someone else might have assumed it meant he didn't care, but Jemma knew him better than that—knew that he loved her and that it was for her sake he didn't fight it.

But she doesn't know the whole story. He's got some guilt of his own to bear.

Grant is not a good man. He's long since accepted it. He's always known that he doesn't deserve Jemma, that he's unworthy of her love. But it wasn't until that moment, when she cried in his arms, trying to simultaneously ask for a divorce and apologize for asking, that he realized just _how_ unworthy.

Giving in without a fight wasn't his first instinct. He's one of SHIELD's best; he's highly trained and well-practiced in manipulation, and standing there with his arms full of his sobbing wife, he automatically began to plan how best to manipulate _her_.

It took him less than five minutes to devise a course of action. A sharp word here, gentle pressure there, and he could've had her so twisted up she never even _thought_ about leaving him again.

And he was going to do it.

Even knowing how miserable he was making her, how lonely and unhappy she was thanks to his actions, he would've kept her with him—would've turned her around so thoroughly that she wouldn't have even remembered why she wanted a divorce in the first place. He was just that selfish—that fucking twisted.

It was only the realization of exactly what he was doing—planning to play his wife like she was a _mark_ , like she was a criminal or a terrorist instead of the woman he loved—that stopped him. He realized, then, exactly how unworthy of her he was, and that was the end of any urge he had to fight the divorce.

She deserved to be free of him. She _still_ deserves it. But here she is, crying in his lap, clinging to him like she trusts him.

He wonders if he'll ever stop being crushed under the weight of that guilt.

x

Jemma is feeling an odd mix of peaceful and mortified by the time her tears stop.

Guiltily, she stays exactly where she is even once she's regained control of herself. Grant's arms are warm and familiar around her, and she can't quite bring herself to leave the safety of them. It's terribly unfair of her—to take advantage of his feelings for her own comfort—but…she simply hasn't the strength _not_ to.

"I'm sorry," she says, eventually.

"Don't be," he says. He presses a kiss to her hair, quick and reflexive. "It's been a long week for all of us. It sounds like you needed it."

"I am _sick_ of crying," she grumbles, and forces herself to slide out of his lap. He doesn't try to stop her, though she fancies there's reluctance in how slowly his arms fall away from her. "And I was meant to be bringing you up to speed."

"Jemma," Grant sighs, exasperated. "I wasn't asking to be brought up to speed. I was asking about _you_." He hesitates, then lays his hand gently on top of hers where it rests between them. "You don't need to apologize for what you're feeling."

He gives her a little half smile, and though her heart aches, she can't help returning it. She must have said that to him at least a dozen times in their first year of dating, back before he adjusted to sharing that part—the vulnerable, emotional part—of himself with her.

He is just _determined_ to make this difficult for her, isn't he?

…Actually, he's not. He's clearly doing his best _not_ to pressure her, which, of course, only makes it worse.

"Thank you," she says, and turns her hand to lace their fingers. It's an indulgence, but after spending at least fifteen minutes in his lap, it seems harmless. "And you're right; I suppose I did need that." She's never been one to feel better after crying, but surprisingly, it really does seem to have helped. Certainly much of the horrible tightness in her chest has eased. "I'm simply…frustrated. This is no time to be crying."

"Actually," he says. "It's the perfect time."

She…has no idea what that's supposed to mean. "I'm sorry?"

"It's better to get it over with now," Grant says. His tone is practical, but his thumb sweeps over her knuckles, soothing. "You were betrayed, and that's gonna leave a mark. It's good to absorb it while you're safe instead of letting it hit you in the field."

She loves him a little for that, for the easy assumption that she'll still be in the field. He's never been anything but supportive of her efforts—even when he called her in September, having heard the rumor that she and Fitz were joining a field team, he didn't scold her or try to talk her out of it at all. He merely asked her to be careful and told her to call him if she ever needed help.

"Fitz doesn't believe it," she confides, rather than dwelling on his unthinking acceptance. "He's convinced that there's another explanation—that he's being controlled or coerced somehow." She glances at him to find him watching her with a steady gaze, which somehow makes it easier to add, "I'm so afraid it will get him killed."

Grant is silent for a long moment.

"I can't promise that it won't," he admits eventually. "That kind of hesitation's a liability in the field." He squeezes her hand. "What I _can_ promise you is that I'm gonna do everything in my power to get your team through this in one piece. Okay?"

Damn him. Is it any wonder she still associates him with love and safety?

"Okay," she says.

"Okay," he repeats.

Silence stretches out between them, easy and comfortable. For the first time in days, Jemma's thoughts are slowing down. They're still not terribly pleasant—they drift from the smile Rollins gave her when she ordered him to get some rest at Providence to Skye crying on her shoulder this morning to the threat that HYDRA poses to Grant calling her sweetheart and then back to Rollins—but they're…calmer. More settled.

For the first time in days, the awful dread that's been building in the pit of her stomach is gone. She no longer feels that disaster is approaching; instead, this feels like just another mission.

Simply having Grant here, knowing that he'll have their backs—that Clint will have their backs—has done so much to ease her fear.

She tries not to dwell on that.

Eventually, Grant gives her a teasing look, apparently intending to lighten the mood. "So. Is this the right time to ask about you shooting superior officers?"

She groans and lets go of his hand in favor of covering her face. "I'm going to _kill_ Skye."

He laughs, and a little more of the tightness in her chest eases.

So much for getting her heart under control.


End file.
